Using technology to accelerate the decarbonisation of buildings is proving to be a gamechanger for architectural practice KPF, as Elias Anka explains.
Designing to optimise wind and thermal comfort, daylight access and carbon reduction has long been part of the process for many new buildings and has traditionally involved specialist consultants for compliance modelling and planning submission. But advances in software development mean that practices like KPF can now integrate this process from the outset, enabling designs to be more responsive to climate and local conditions.
KPF’s portfolio spans super-tall buildings, adaptive reuse projects, mixed-use developments, masterplanning and significant civic developments. Notable completed works include the Shanghai World Financial Center, the Hudson Yards Master Plan in New York and London’s Heron Tower.
Currently, KPF is transforming the former HSBC Tower in Canary Wharf into a vibrant mixed-use space reflecting global trends in sustainable renovation. It has also unveiled a University of Birmingham 2045 Campus Vision, for redevelopment of the university’s campus, and in 2024, its Terminal A at Zayed International Airport in UAE was named the World’s Most Beautiful Airport.
Elias Anka, an architect and associate principal at KPF, leads the environmental performance team in the London office. The team uses early design tools for energy modelling and microclimate modelling, and embodies carbon calculations, for example.
“There’s a much greater value given to the performance of the building – weighted scoring means this counts as much as what it looks like.”
Anka says KPF’s approach to integrating advanced simulation tools and sustainable design principles is redefining how architectural practices address decarbonisation. By using in-house expertise and cutting-edge technology, the firm is optimising building performance and influencing industrywide sustainability standards.
Sustainable performance
Anka emphasises the shift from sustainability being an add-on or an afterthought to becoming an integral core design principle. Automation is significantly reducing analysis complexity, cutting simulation times from days to hours, thereby enabling different design options to be considered and their impacts demonstrated.
He says: “There’s a much greater value given to the performance of the building – weighted scoring means this counts as much as what it looks like.
“The tools have advanced and the process has become more integrated and automated. Wind studies, for example, used to take days and days. But now, with platforms like SimScale [an environmental engineering simulation software], you can get results in hours.
“We build tools within the Revit and Grasshopper environment for processes such as embodied carbon calculations, energy modelling, daylight, microclimate modelling and solar gains reduction – they’re all aspects of a performance-driven design.”
Advanced simulation techniques
Environmental performance in action
81 Newgate in the City of London, otherwise known as Panorama St Paul’s, is a KPF flagship project where environmental performance design was critical. The adaptive reuse scheme is a transformation of an outdated 1980s office building into a contemporary mixed-use development, featuring a new street through the site. It is expected to be completed later this year.
The modernisation is creating flexible workplaces with larger office floorplates and plentiful outside space. At every opportunity, office floors are provided with their own external terraces, created by a stepped composition of new bays.
The project improves the building’s environmental performance and minimises environmental impact by reusing 95% of the Portland stone from the existing building. It also employs modular construction methods, specifies low-carbon materials and adopts a zero-to-landfill policy.
Environmental performance modelling was critical to improve daylight access and views over St Paul’s, at the same time ensuring the design was within the existing structure and reduced the carbon footprint.
“We did a great deal of in-house energy modelling, daylight analysis and wind analysis to make sure that it is comfortable for pedestrians nearby,” says Anka. “We also undertook embodied carbon calculations at the early stages to get a sense of whether the building would meet the very low targets that had been set.”
KPF is among the select practices that have become increasingly proficient in using advanced simulation techniques. Many firms either lack the necessary resources, or cannot allocate sufficient research and development time to fully optimise these tools, says Anka. “Having a specialist environmental support team and exploring new technology options is an investment. It requires the buy-in from leadership to be able to provide this support and to be able to build in time for R&D.”
Having an in-house team as opposed to using external consultants in advanced stages of design, explains Anka, means expertise is immediately available to support design optimisation and effectively advocate for sustainable strategies to clients.
For example, a client might be nervous about a proposal to opt for natural ventilation. “It allows us to validate our designs in-house, that opting for natural ventilation helps reduce energy, before other consultants come in.
“Natural ventilation is a strategy that is quite tricky to maintain on a project as it evolves, either because it is too costly or the energy reduction is not substantial enough to make the argument. So we try to validate these calculations in-house,” says Anka. “It is important to make the case for natural ventilation, not just from an energy perspective, but also for providing a minimum fresh air requirement and promoting health and wellbeing, improving working conditions and enhancing productivity.”
He cites another example: “We are working on a large building in Lisbon where we developed an early-design tool for embodied carbon assessment. The project involved cladding to a proposed building and we were able to try out options for a range of different materials, from UHPC (ultra-high-performance concrete) to terracotta to aluminium, to quantify the upfront carbon impact for these systems.”
Exploring immersion
KPF is also exploring VR and XR to visualise results in a more immersive way, which can make the design more accessible to clients. It is also using AI to visualise aspects of the design that a client might be concerned about, using Midjourney, Runway and other resources.
“I’m hopeful that in five years, we’ll have tools and workflows that are purely driven by an AI-trained model.”
“For example, the environmental performance team proposed evaporative cooling as an integral strategy to optimising outdoor thermal comfort in a project in the Middle East. Evaporative cooling is the passive cooling effect of water. The design proposed mistifiers into a large canopy covering a retail hub, and the client was eager to visualise it.”
Anka believes there is scope for AI to be a gamechanger for accelerating workflows. He says it is still some way off providing accurate results, but does provide general trends and patterns to consider and the means to give indicative results rapidly.
One new piece of software that has caught his attention is Infrared City, a platform for intelligent and resilient design based on AI. “I’m hopeful that in five years, we’ll have tools and workflows that are purely driven by an AI-trained model,” he says.
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